Of Melancholic Reminiscence
by Moonlight Memories
Summary: The White Witch may have long since died, and renounced her claim on Edmund besides – but he isn't nearly as free of her as he'd like to be. Now that he can no longer return to Narnia, it's time to pay the true price for his boyhood mistake. Peter/Edmund, Incest, Slash, Character death.


Disclaimer: Don't own Narnia.

Warnings: Slash, Incest, Character Death (Sort of), Sex, Possible OOC characters.

* * *

Edmund has to admit it now that he's back.

In Narnia it was nothing to be bothered with, because he was always in the sun. For that reason he'd vainly hoped never to return to Earth. On Earth the seasons must change. On Earth life is constantly ending and renewing – and even though it was much the same as Narnia, Narnia had never experienced the cycle on this magnitude. And most of all… most of all, Aslan forced the White Witch to renounce her claim on his life on Narnia, not on Earth. The White Witch had died on Narnia, not on Earth. The protection Aslan had given him was on Aslan, not on Earth, tied to the land of Narnia and the titles he'd owned then, not on Earth where he's just another little boy – except soon he will not be, would he?

"You must never tell your siblings," Aslan had said gravely in his ear. "Not until it is time. And perhaps never, if you so choose."

Edmund didn't understand then. He didn't acknowledge it, and perhaps it did not need understanding because it was fine there. Because there he was protected.

"Edmund?" Peter asks. Edmund jerks in surprise – he had not expected to find company then. "What are you doing still up?"

Edmund hides his hand from Peter subtly, placing both hands against the wall as if bouncing off it. "I was thinking."

Even when he'd left it hadn't really mattered, because he'd known that he would visit Narnia again. Because he was still linked to that land. It was a fact that thrummed in his blood and sang in his soul. But now… now… Aslan said he would never return there again, and so it was to be. Even as Aslan said those words, Edmund could feel the tenuous hold of the old protections slide free.

And he hated it.

"I couldn't sleep,"he answers.

"Nightmares?" King Peter the Magnificent asks. Edmund sucks in a breath, forcing the already tenuous protections to stay when they wish to flee to Peter, to return to the High King, even if they are no longer in Narnia – because King Peter holds most of Narnia between all of them, even now. Even when Lucy can still return, even when it is Lucy who has the ties to Narnia.

He hates Peter's presence now. He hates himself for hating it, but cannot stop hating Peter's presence anyway.

But not Peter himself. _Never_ Peter himself.

"Yes," Edmund replies, and it's not even really a lie.

The entirety of Earth is a nightmare now… it only awaits the monster that lies within Edmund, and Edmund hates himself for it.

"… Is it Narnia?" Peter whispers, pain evident in his eyes.

Edmund starts, remembering – remembering how he'd kissed Peter as High King Peter, the Magnificent, and how he'd loved every minute of it – even if it was a bit of an accident, really. How Peter had loved every minute of it… And he remembers the first time they'd touched, not in innocence or platonic affection but in something of a romance – then returning here, to a cold, flat world, to have Peter say that they could never love one another again. But that had been very long ago, and his hurts have long since been mended.

He has made his peace – what happened in Narnia can never be replaced or erased in either of their hearts. It will linger on in every relationship they have, with each other or with any other. Always comparing, always wishing – and Edmund has made his peace with that.

Memories, after all, are always being rewritten – and memories as sweet as those are always rewritten to be better, larger than life. They are always rewritten so that the flaws diminish, even as they are built up on, agonised over.

He will never be replaced, or forgotten.

He will always be Best, will always be First – even if he has probably long since stopped being Most Important.

But now – perhaps it is for the best. if they had continued their relationship, the protections would have long been -

He finds himself with an armful of Peter, and gingerly he hugs back. "There is," Peter whispers, "No point in dwelling on what we cannot have," he finishes, and it is exactly what he'd said to Edmund when they'd returned. And afterward, even when he'd returned to Narnia it was never Them again. "We will return."

Edmund longs to remove himself from Peter, so that the protections will settle again – no matter how precariously – but still, even after all these years, Peter's arms give him a kind of safety that can never be replicated.

It is a pity that he won't be able to enjoy this for long, but he refuses to feel sorry for himself. He had made his choice then, when he'd taken her hand.

He stares at his hand over Peter's broad shoulders. Specifically, he stares at the long, white fingers. The colour of snow. On the pad of his index finger is a snowflake, though it's summer and there is no way a snowflake could get in – and more than that, there is no way that it would not have melted on human fingers – but Edmund has been watching it for an hour now.

A tear slips down his face and plops onto Peter's shoulder.

Peter holds him tighter, but says nothing – likely assuming that Edmund is mourning Narnia. And perhaps he is, but more than that he mourns the inevitable loss of his humanity.

He hopes that he will retain sense, but if he does not, he knows that Peter will do the right thing.

* * *

He watches Susan study, leaning over her red-brown mahogany desk with her pencil moving back and forth as she mouths words to herself. And he engraves the sight into his mind – when will he ever see her again? She is going away soon, and by the time she returns – by the time she returns, the first snow would have fallen. He would have – would have -

He feels keenly that he is wasting his time.

But it's fine – it's fine to memorise his siblings. It's fine that he is wasting time.

"Edmund?" Lucy asks.

Turning, he smiles at her and meets her eyes.

"You know you'll return to Narnia someday, don't you?" she asks, in a shushed voice. "I know that Peter thinks that we're not going back, and Susan…" her voice dips. "But we'll go back," she says fiercely. "I swear it, all of us will go back to Narnia someday!"

Edmund smiles softly at her, feeling a surge of tenderness well up within him. "Yes, I'm sure that Peter will go back someday," he agrees. It resonates in his veins and in his blood – Peter is inextricably a part of Narnia.

"All of us!" Lucy exclaims. "Susan, too!"

Edmund smiles. "Susan too," he echoes obligingly, but does not include himself in this. He smiles at the thought, closing his eyes to picture the scene – by that time he would have dissolved into the snow, become one of the White Witch's kin, wouldn't he?

If nothing else, he never wants to be as the White Witch was.

"Someday," he whispers. "It'll happen."

He just wishes that he'd be alive to see it.

* * *

He finds himself standing over the new piano they'd gotten, pressing the keys absently. The melody resonates in his soul, as any melody does these days. The remnants of the protections shudder against him, but hold firm, and despite himself he sits and and plays a song. His fingers are sometimes clumsy – they have grown longer somehow. Longer and colder and numb – so naturally he is clumsy at their use. Still he plays. Plays and plays and plays and allows it to reverbrate against his soul, and when a thin string of the protections snaps he ignores it – just plays and plays and plays. He needs no air. He needs no food. He needs no sleep. He feels no hunger, no thirst, and only once or twice does he feel any pleasure or pain whatsoever. Because of this, he holds such sensations close to his chest when he feels them, treasuring them.

But this. This feeling is… exquisite. It thrums along with his heart, shivers deep inside him – slowly unravelling all of himself as if he was in bed with High King Peter again, lying skin-to-skin and wishing that he dared reach out for what lay just beyond their reach.

He can hardly even appreciate the melody anymore – he can hardly hear it for all the feelings it invokes in him.

It nearly rids him of thought. It makes his heart flutter. It – It – here, there – it awakens him, it -

It destroys him.

Reluctantly he releases himself from this exquisite state, and as the melody disappears, so does his good mood.

"What was that melody?" Peter asks suddenly, sounding a little way behind him.

Edmund turns to meet Peter's eyes and tries to recall what was it that he had played. He can't remember. He could hardly hear it for all the emotions, but it was such a perfect – it could be a song of sorrow and he might have felt the same.

He wonders if this is how fauns feel when they listen to a piece of music.

Still, he has no way of answering this question.

He smiles instead of answering.

"It was so haunting," Peter murmurs, an odd look in his eyes that Edmund only vaguely recognises. "I know have never heard it played before – I would have remembered such a such a melody."

Edmund smiles. "Why must you have its name?" he asks. "Is it not enough to have its memory?"

Because memories are constantly built upon, and someday when Peter reflects on this again – as he no doubt does when he reflects on Them – he will remember it as the most beautiful melody in the world. Nothing will match up to it, just as nothing will match up to the him of Peter's memories. It will be just another thing about Edmund that he cannot help but recall fondly. And when someday he listens to a piece of music even more beautiful than this, and when he meets someone who matches him even more perfectly than Edmund had matched him in Narnia, he will think of this music, will think of Edmund, and somehow he will always believe that this music was more beautiful, that Edmund had matched him better. And he will either settle for what he has and be miserable, and look for someone else or some other piece of music and never find anyone or any piece of music better.

That is the nature of memories.

"I must have it," Peter murmurs. "I must listen to it again. I must!"

"I do not know its title – nor do I remember how to play it. I suppose you must be content to remember it, " Edmund says with a small smile.

"Surely you remember parts of it, at the least!" Peter says, desperate.

Edmund frowns. He is beginning to realise that the piece of music must have been more beautiful than he had first thought, if Peter has taken leave of his good manners to ask it of Edmund in such a fashion.

"Perhaps I remember a few of the early notes," he agrees cautiously. "But afterwards – Afterwards I was…" He closes his eyes for a moment, intent on finding the right word for it. It dances out of his reach for a few moments, but eventually he grasps it. When he does, the nerves fade away into a soothing serenity. "Lost," he says, almost to himself. He had been lost in the melody. Hopelessly lost, and he had not wanted to be found. "I stopped – stopped trying to decide what notes to play, because my fingers were moving for me."

He barely heard what he was playing, anyway.

"I did not know that this piano could produce such a beautiful melody," Peter says, sounding spellbound. There is a wretched desperation in his eyes, and Edmund knows that he must never let mortal ears hear any piece of music that he plays ever again – if such a melody could ensnare the senses even while the protections still remain – while he is still partly human – what would it do as he progresses towards his loss of humanity? Would it cause them to take leave of their senses entirely, puppets whose strings are forever attached to Edmund's inhuman fingers?

He can't bear the thought.

He steps away from the piano, watching as Peter determinedly tries – he assumes – to recreate that same melody with his fingers… and knows that it will not be the same.

It will be a legend of sorts, hidden deep in Peter's mind. Edmund thinks that he might look for it forever.

Guiltily, despite himself, he feels a small burst of happiness in his heart.

Peter will look for Edmund forever, and he won't even know it.

No one else will ever play that melody, except perhaps by the greatest of coincidences, and even then it will never match up to Peter's memories.

As Peter begins to play, the strange feelings rise up in his chest again.

Edmund turns away.

He has had enough of that feeling for today, and if he stays he might lose all the protections – but then, some things are worth that.

"Where are you going?" Peter asks.

"Back to my room," Edmund replies.

"You can't go yet! I need your help to play that melody!" Peter exclaims.

"I don't remember the way it was played," Edmund points out. "And I'm tired," he adds.

"I… it reminds me so much of Narnia," Peter says quietly. The way his face goes devoid of emotion is sad and even a little eerie, but this is not worth the snapping of his protections. Not yet. Or perhaps the phrase is 'Not anymore'. He loves Peter still, of course – he always will. Peter's memories aren't the only ones to constantly be altered to become an image of perfection, after all. Peter will always be First and Best, just as he will be to Peter. But… but he doesn't love Peter with the dangerous, all-consuming intensity of what he had before. If he did, he would never be able to let go of Peter. "Narnia was magical, too."

And besides, he doesn't have time for this.

"I'm sorry, Peter," Edmund murmurs. "But _there is no point in dwelling on what we cannot have,_" he says, parroting Peter's words back at him. "You learnt to deal with Narnia's loss, with…" his voice constricts. "Surely you will learn to deal with this too."

It isn't fair. He knows it isn't fair.

But life isn't fair.

"Edmund…" Peter says, a look of loss on his face before that, too, is hidden away again. But that's fine – what is hidden has value. That is why it is hidden in the first place. You would hide your most precious of jewels from thieves, and perhaps your mementos of your dead lover, even though it does not cost half as much. But you would not hide cheap, useless items away. Instead you might throw them out when they have no use.

"High King Peter," Edmund whispers. "I have not forgotten, have you?"

"No," Peter admits softly.

Edmund's chest constricts, and he longs so much to return to that time, that place, that world. he would have given anything to have reached for that opportunity, to have kissed those pale pink lips in the way he wants to.

"That's good," Edmund agrees.

But Peter is right. There is no point in dwelling on such things.

Just as there is no point dwelling on a world in which he was never foolish enough to take the hand of the White Witch, or a world in which he does not have this problem – a world where his only problem, like that of his siblings, is the thought of never returning to Narnia again.

It's funny. but perhaps it is because he is losing his humanity that he knows Peter will certainly return to Narnia someday.

Susan has nearly forgotten, but he hopes that someday she will remember that she was Queen Susan the hopes that someday, she will see her dreams and wishes come to life again – in a world where she can rule over and be happy. He hates the way she longs for a place she believes does not exist.

If he could only show her…

He watches Peter's back for a few moments longer, then allows his feet to carry him away.

* * *

Edmund hums as he does his chores. It's always a little easier with a little music running through him.

This must be how drug addicts feel like, he thinks to himself, remembering the lecture on how drugs make the world brighter, clearer, more beautiful. Music does that for him. It improves his mood, too, and creates something deep inside him that he cannot deny is pleasant. It's almost like pleasure, and perhaps it is, but he hasn't felt pleasure in such a long time that he can't be sure.

He spies Susan at the corner of his eyes. She has chosen to go to a nearby school rather than a boarding school, and he has never been more thankful for anything in his life.

"That's a catchy tune. What's it called?" Susan asks.

Edmund freezes in horror as he realises that he's humming another nameless tune. Thankfully, Susan does not seem to have noticed his sudden horror.

"I can't recall," he replies.

He sees the crestfallen look on her face – a little more than would be expected from a simple song – and tells himself that he must never sing again, either. Not in the presence of anyone else, anyway.

His heart aches.

* * *

He catches Peter awake at night again – which really makes no sense. Unlike him, Peter is wholly human. He should have no troubles falling asleep – especially as his eyes are ringed with black circles and he probably needs it quite badly.

No matter how much Edmund wants to sleep, he cannot. It is no longer a question of desire but one of ability. He has lost his ability to sleep.

It broke his heart to figure that out, too.

"Edmund?" Peter asks, sounding surprised. "Why are you outside?"

"It seems more peaceful this way, doesn't it?" Edmund asks.

"You should be asleep," Peter chides gently, but instead of dragging Edmund into the house, he follows Edmund out of the house and sits by the door, beside Edmund. Together they stare out in front of them, like kings surveying their land.

Edmund feels a twinge of pain as he realises that they can never be kings surveying their land again – not together.

"Is it Narnia?" Edmund asks tentatively.

Peter sighs. "Isn't it always? I find it hard to sleep, sometimes, knowing what I will dream of… and knowing that when I open my eyes again I will find that it was all a dream," Peter says, and Edmund sees shiny tears glint in his eyes. "Sometimes I wonder if it was," Peter adds in an even softer tone. "And other times I fear becoming – treating it as though it were an imaginary game, as Susan does."

"You won't," Edmund promises.

"How can you be so sure?" Peter asks.

Edmund smiles, feeling the protections shudder against what Peter still holds. What Edmund no longer holds. "Because you still carry it in your heart."

"What if I stop? What if I forget? Aslan, what if I -"

"Even if you forget, even if you believe it a dream – don't you see? You'll always remember some form of it! You will always be the High King of Narnia! It will _always_ be with you, as long as you continue to treasure it. We lived it, Peter. We lived years and years of our lives there. How could we ever truly forget? Even Susan has not truly forgotten. If you ask her now… If you ask her now, and phrase it the right way, I'm sure she still remembers the dances. I'm sure she still remembers Mr. Tumnus and the White Witch. She only categorises it in a slightly different way – she will_ always_ remember it."

It brings him comfort to say these words – because it means that Peter and the others will never forget him, either.

"In your dreams you visit it again – what is wrong with that? Do not be so greedy for reality that you forget to treasure what you find in your dreams," Edmund murmurs.

Because Edmund cannot find Narnia even in his dreams – after all, he cannot sleep.

"Do you remember the melody you played on the piano?" Peter asks.

Edmund nods hesitantly, reluctant to approach this topic.

"I have tried – so many times. But it feels like that melody was something out of a dream. This piano cannot possibly produce such notes, can it?" Peter asks.

Edmund smiles, watching Peter's eyelids weigh down. "Shall I sing you a lullaby?" he whispers.

Peter smiles, but does not reply even as he settles comfortably against Edmund's shoulder.

In the morning he will pretend that Peter only had a dream – if Peter asked at all. But now he feels as though he must sing one, to better help his brother fall asleep. Peter cannot go without sleep. It's unhealthy and possibly dangerous too.

Edmund sighs and opens his mouth to sing. A lullabye, he thinks to himself, and accidentally and fortunately hits on the perfect one. "I sing to you, my king," he sings.

As he sings, images cover his eyes – of light filtering through the trees of the forests, of their four neglected thrones, of Cair Paravel covered by green plants and wildflowers – even if it makes his heart ache to utter such things. He sings of them, sings of their adventures, sings of everything he knows of and remembers while willing Peter to always remember, too.

When he finally ends, Peter is asleep on his shoulder.

He shifts slightly, leaning against the door, and waits out the morning.

* * *

Peter yawns.

Edmund removes his hand from Peter's waist – it was really only there to keep Peter from falling. "Good morning," he says with a smile.

Peter blushes, the red of his blush all the way to his neck. He looks at Edmund as though – as though they were still in Narnia, and that beautiful, passionate look all but drives Edmund mad. _Utterly mad_. It makes him ache again, wish dearly for a time long past, wish that he'd found the courage to – to – to do something about this. But neither he nor Peter ever thought there was an expiry date to this, so they'd foolishly taken their time.

And now Peter is looking at him like this. It aches inside Edmund, and he thinks it will always ache.

"Did you allow me to lie here for the entirety of the night?" Peter whispers.

Edmund smiles and looks away, unwilling to indulge in the intensity of Peter's gaze. He can't feel pain anymore. Most days all he feels is numb. Sometimes he feels pleasure, but even then it is mostly found in song, in music. He still daydreams of days where he'd known the simple pleasure of lying on a bed and enjoying the way it moulded to fit his body. "You looked as though you hadn't slept in a long time," he murmurs. "I thought it best not to awaken you."

Peter reaches out and takes Edmund's cheek, shifting it gently so that they are looking in each other's eyes. "Didn't it hurt your shoulder?" he whispers, though he doesn't move.

"You worry unduly, Peter, I -"Edmund starts to say, but Peter is leaning closer and closer and he can barely breathe. He opens his mouth to disagree, to say 'No', to say 'Don't', to tell Peter that he is tainted and wrong and that the time for such foolishness has long past – but finds himself quite unable to speak a word. And as their lips meet, the pleasure that he'd only found in music returns to him, warm and slow and too much like there are long, sinuous snakes moving in his body, uncoiling with lust. And as Peter's tongue probes his lips, he cannot help but shiver – though not from cold… it's been a long time since he'd felt cold. And it is beautiful. It is glorious. It is devastating. It is like the sky has fallen and the stars are just out of reach, burning outstretched hands before they are caught and winking as they crash upon the world, as the world burns and destroys itself. There are few things more beautiful, or horrible. And perhaps, for this reason… for this reason he does not dare return the kiss.

Peter's hand rests on Edmund's neck tentatively, then abruptly tightens as Edmund parts his lips. And when he feels Peter's tongue in his mouth – there is nothing that can compare. It slides against Edmund's tongue, slippery and sly as Edmund had felt as a child, lying about having visited Narnia. And yet Edmund also feels sparks where it touches him, sparks and tingles and the relentless uncoiling of… of what? He isn't sure. It feels like his very self, his very beliefs are uncoiling as they kiss… and his eyes flutter shut in resignation.

Nothing will ever feel like this. He knows this.

But he cannot have this. He will soon cease to be a being of this world.

And yet…

He feels a tear slide down his cheek, feels Peter's reassuring hands wipe it away and slide around his waist as if to pull him closer – but if there is any way to be closer to this, he is ignorant of it.

Yes, he knows he cannot have this. But he cannot pull away.

It is – it is too perfect. It is so perfect it brings almost brings more tears to its eyes just because. And perhaps it is not flawless – but things do not have to be flawless to be perfect. He understands this acutely now. Understands it with a clarity that almost makes him double up in pain, because if he had reached for this in Narnia – if he had… if, if.

But nothing lasts forever. This doesn't have to either.

He surrenders. He knows it to be foolish, knows that he is resigning Peter to an inevitable heartbreak. And because of this he wants nothing more than to stop, to pull away – but that feels like an ability that is now beyond him.

Peter kisses him even more enthusiastically now that he is returning the kiss, and perhaps he is interpreting that as Edmund having given his consent – but Edmund's consent was always given, or he would have pulled away. This is only – only his selfishness. No matter how much he tells himself to be fair to Peter, to be fair to them, he cannot stop himself from continuing the kiss, from holding Peter and allowing himself to feel like this.

He wants to stop. Really he does. But he can't. He wants to, so badly, to be fair, to be Just. He wants to so much that his heart is aching for it, but he's barely human anyway and the heart's probably a useless organ now. Even so, it doesn't change the fact that no matter how much bitterness he feels, he wants to continue kissing Peter like this. He wants to surrender to the passions he was never allowed to surrender to. He wants to drown in this feeling – he doesn't care what the price is. He wants to care, but he can't. He wants to stop, but that is far outweighed by his desire to continue like this.

He's surprised when Peter is the one to break away, but then notices that Peter is breathing hard – but of course he no longer needs to breathe so it doesn't matter to him.

It's hard not to feel bitter sometimes.

"You are so beautiful," Peter murmurs. "I only wish -"

He does not complete his sentence.

"I'm sorry, Edmund," Peter murmurs, leaning close to his ear. "I know you cried, but even then I couldn't stop," he says, smiling a bitter smile that is not nearly as bitter as Edmund feels. "But you were there, and I – I never stopped wanting…" his voice breaks.

"Me too," Edmund replies quietly. "I never stopped."

Peter smiles – a pathetic smile that Edmund thinks must be on his own lips as well. "I know," he whispers.

It should have made him feel better, he thinks, but it only makes him feel worse.

"I love you," Edmund whispers. "And I always will."

Peter stares at him as if awed.

Edmund smiles at him, then allows his feet to carry him away before they carry him forward to Peter, to drown in those dark, sinful eyes that constantly invite him to spend eternity with them.

If he drowns in those eyes he will never return to the real world – and willingly so.

"Edmund!" Peter shouts, just as Edmund makes it back to his own room.

Edmund slams the door behind him loudly. He has no wish to hear Peter's scoldings or worse, a confession that his feelings are returned.

His lifespan is measured in weeks – months at best. Peter's is measured in years.

It would not be fair.

And perhaps one could argue that he might live forever – but he would have to die first, because Edmund Pevensie is a human being. Whatever he might become, it is not a human being. He might not even love Peter any longer. This thought scares him, as it always does.

He would not be himself.

The tears that come to his eyes are cold, and he thanks Aslan that the tears he'd shed in Peter's presence had still been warm.

It's just another thing that he can never do in anyone else's presence again.

And despite his resignation to his fate, he feels his heart break just a little bit more – because he will never be able to see the role he could have played beside Peter, because the beautiful, horrible visions he'd dreamt up in his youth will never get so much as a chance to come to pass.

He might be relieved when the protections vanish entirely, he thinks. At the least, it might be a chance to rest forever.

* * *

"I went to Narnia," Lucy says in a small voice. "Do you want to hear about it?"

Edmund smiles. "Yes, please."

Despite everything, he still loves Narnia.

Unlike his elder siblings – who can now no longer bear any mention of it whatsoever – he is willing to listen to anyone speak of it. It is not a taboo subject with him, as it is with the others. Perhaps it's because he knows that he truly will never return, whereas Peter can still hope. And he – he loves Narnia. Perhaps he loves it even more now that he knows that he will never see it again. Sometimes he certainly thinks so. After all, the saying goes that absence makes the heart grow fonder, and familiarity breeds contempt.

Sometimes he thinks he should hate Narnia. He muses about this even as he listens to Lucy's enthusiastic words. He should. It will kill him. It was always going to kill him – but then, he was the one who made the first mistake, was he not?

And even if it was not, he finds it hard to hate the realm that gave him a home and harder still to hate the world that had showed him what he could truly feel for Peter.

No, he loves Narnia, perhaps just a little less than he loves Peter, and certainly more than he loves his sisters – but he has always been a selfish boy. As he grew he's learnt to be generous, to be Just – for that was what was expected of him.

It is times like this that he wonders if he was the real reason why they stayed in Narnia for fifteen glorious years – because Aslan knew, and wanted to give him a few years of happiness, of growing up before the inevitable.

He will not argue or quarrel – hasn't he nearly always been happy since they first saw Narnia?

Even this is worth it.

"That sounds wonderful," Edmund murmurs.

"Isn't it?" Lucy asks, prattling on happily.

Edmund smiles, glad to be able to be here for her. When he is gone – he hopes that she will not think too harshly of the land they love.

"Edmund," Lucy says, suddenly solemn.

Edmund smiles at her.

"Aslan said… no, it's silly," she says to herself, and Edmund frowns. Nothing Aslan said has ever been silly.

"What did he say?" Edmund asks.

"He said that you'll disappear," Lucy says, her voice trembling, and Edmund cannot bear to look at her while she looks at him which such eyes. "He said that before the year ends, we'll never – never see you again," she says, her shoulders shaking. "It's a lie, isn't it?"

Edmund cannot look her in the eyes.

"It's a lie, isn't it?" Lucy repeats more loudly, her voice bordering on shrill.

Edmund does not answer.

He does not like lying to Lucy. Once, he -

He was foolish, once.

"When has Aslan ever lied?" Edmund whispers at last.

"Why?" Lucy asks, voice shaking. "I don't understand."

Edmund smiles. He thinks he can see why Lucy is Peter's favourite. He sees it in the sorrow sparkling in her eyes, the tears that have yet to fall. He sees it in the downturned mouth and the clenched fists, as if she were helpless to do anything, as if she wanted badly to do something. "Shall I tell you a story?" he asks.

Lucy nods slowly.

"Once there was a silly little boy he was willing to betray his siblings for a chance – any chance – to be the best. And so he befriended the beautiful woman in white who promised him the throne of the High King in return for his siblings.

But the woman was a witch. He found out about this, and yet he was too foolish to stop seeing her."

"But you made up for it," Lucy whispers.

Edmund smiles sadly. "Not everything is wiped clean simply because I repented."

"What happened?" Lucy asks, after a moment.

Edmund shrugs. "The usual things. The boy was rescued by a great lion, and the witch was vanquished. The boy repented and became a king. But there is always a price when one strikes a deal with a witch – and the poor, naive king did not know of it, or did not wish to know of it," he admits with bitterness.

Lucy's breath catches. "What was the price?"

"At first, the Witch wished for the boy's life – but the great lion intervened and the boy was about to live. And in return for the life of the great lion, the boy was also granted protection from the deal he made. This protection was tied to the titles that the boy owned, as well as land that the boy ruled. All was well.

But the boy could not stay in Narnia forever. One day, he would lose all ties – or nearly all ties – to Narnia, and the Narnian protection magics would break away from him to return to their home," he finishes.

"What happens then?" Lucy whispers, staring at him out of haunted eyes.

"The usual things," Edmund replies, equally softly. "The usual things that happens to traitors, that is. They die, or disappear, or become even greater enemies."

Lucy shakes her head, tears streaming down her face. She is, he reflects, a rather pretty crier. Her eyelashes look damp, but they look thicker as well. Her shiny red cheeks paint a picture of misery, but not of blotchy imperfection. "No. I can't – Narnia isn't like that!" Lucy exclaims.

Edmund smiles at her, trying to console her. "It's alright," he promises. "Don't stop loving Narnia. Don't stop wanting to return. Someday you will return, you know. I will never -" his voice catches, and even though he has already thought about this numerous times, it still hurts. "I will never return to Narnia. But I will always love it. And if you continue to love it, we will, both of us, always be connected with our love. When you remember Narnia, always remember me. And when you remember me, always remember that I love Narnia, that I will always love Narnia – as long as I am still me."

"That's not fair," Lucy sobs, throwing herself at him. "That's not fair at all."

"Would you go to the shops and take whatever you wanted without paying for it? Everything has a price, and it's good enough of Aslan to have saved me from paying for it until now," Edmund says.

"No. No, it doesn't deserve – you've already paid for it! Why do you have to pay twice? It's not fair!"

He wraps his arms around her, rocking her gently to console her.

"We must tell Peter," Lucy weeps. "We must -"

"No," Edmund disagrees. "We won't tell them. If Aslan wanted them to know, then even through all of this distance he would have found a way to reach them. If we tell them it would only give them heartache."

"They'll know. They'll find you gone. Oh Edmund, I can't bear it! You'll take Peter with you, and I will never forgive either of you," she weeps.

"Don't be silly," Edmund whispers. "Peter will never know. He won't even think to look. And – there will be no body. Even if there was – Peter is stronger than that. What we had… it was a feeling that we left behind in Narnia. Susan will be here. Peter, too. You will, all three of you, return to Narnia. I know it."

"It's not fair," Lucy whispers, creating damp patches all over his shoulder. "It's not fair. We're so young. "

"Life isn't," Edmund murmurs.

* * *

It seems that everywhere he is, Lucy is there, too. But it's already the beginning of autumn and she's probably nervous about his leaving.

That's alright. He's nervous too. It's nice that Lucy knows. It's even nicer that she isn't crying about this all the time. He doesn't know what the others might have done, but he doesn't think they would accept this nearly so calmly. But then, he knows that she does cry – only in the privacy of her own room where she thinks he can't hear her, while he stands at her door, hand poised to knock but never managing to bring himself to disrupt her quiet mourning of his impending death.

He will admit that it is nice to be mourned over, despite everything.

"If Susan doesn't remember Narnia, does it mean that she won't be connected to you?" Lucy asks softly, sounding far too young to worry about a brother's death.

"Susan remembers Narnia," Edmund replies. "Even if she remembers it as a game of make-believe, she remembers the dances, she remembers the songs, she remembers Cair Paravel. She remembers being Queen Susan the Gentle and she remembers what I was like as Edmund the Just. She remembers Caspian. I know she does."

"But what if she doesn't love Narnia?" Lucy asks. "I know that I-"

"Lucy," Edmund says quietly. "Susan loves Narnia. Perhaps more than any of us. That's why it hurt her so much to give it up. That's why she can't talk about it anymore. She will always love Narnia. All of us – we will always be connected in this. I promise."

"I wish I could do something," Lucy whispers.

"You are here, aren't you?" Edmund points out.

"If I could give up Narnia in return for your life," Lucy whispers. "I would. In a heartbeat."

"I wouldn't," Edmund replies.

* * *

Edmund is sitting at the door – as he usually does at night – when he hears footsteps behind him. Suspecting that a thief had somehow managed to sneak in, he turns sharply, only to be confronted with Peter.

Peter smiles. "A little paranoid, are we?"

Edmund blushes and shrugs.

"What are you doing this late?" Peter asks, dropping onto the ground beside him. "I didn't think that you'd made a habit out of this."

"I just think – it's beautiful, isn't it?" Edmund asks softly.

"Yes, but that doesn't mean you should be awake at two in the morning."

"Pot, meet kettle," Edmund teases. Them he frowns. "You didn't have another nightmare, did you?" he asks worriedly as Peter leans against him.

"Something like that. I dreamt that you disappeared into the snow," Peter replies. "I thought I'd check up on you – gave me a fright when I realised that you weren't in your room… until I thought to check here."

Edmund winces. That will happen. There is nothing that can be done about it. "I'm sorry."

Peter frowns. "Whatever for? It was not your fault."

Edmund sighs. "For not being in my room, I suppose," he answers, stretching out his arms. "Come on, make yourself comfortable."

Peter blushes and sputters. "I don't – I'm not -"

"It's alright," Edmund says. "I don't mind, and you seemed to sleep very well before. If it helps you to get rid of your nightmares – who am I to argue with that?" he questions rheotorically. "And if you are worried about my arm, don't worry – it didn't hurt before. Not much, anyway," he qualifies, although in truth it did not hurt at all.

He's not _human enough_ for it to hurt.

Peter hesitates, but eventually leans against him. "It's so cold in this part of the house. I wonder why."

Edmund stiffens, but says nothing.

Peter leans closer and pecks him lightly on the cheek. "Forgive me," he whispers in Edmund's ear. "Forgive me for tainting all of our interactions. Forgive me for not being a good older brother. Forgive me for feeling this way."

"There is nothing to forgive," Edmund murmurs. "I feel the same."

"Do you really?" Peter asks softly.

"Since the day we first kissed, I have always been yours," Edmund replies.

Peter chuckles darkly. "Liar."

Edmund does not rise to the bait. He knows they cannot start this, and he himself will refrain from starting anything – but if Peter starts anything he knows he will be helpless to resist. And even if he could have resisted, he would not want to. He will call it fate and let it occur, even if he must break Peter's heart in the end.

"Such a beautiful liar," Peter murmurs.

Edmund smiles absently.

Peter leans closer, pressing a kiss to the side of his lips – and all of a sudden Edmund realises that Peter is not angry with him; he is bitter. He is just as bitter as Edmund for having lost all the opportunities they could have had.

All the opportunities they could still have if Edmund hadn't been stupid enough to strike a deal with a witch.

Slowly, he returns Peter's kiss, tangles his tongue with Peter's and licks, slides, sucks and strokes. He feels his brother's hands roam over his body, and in return he copies the motion slowly. It drives him quite mad to feel those fingers under his shirt as his body is pressed to the ground, as Peter lies over him, not releasing him.

At last Peter parts their mouths, but almost instantly he reattached his mouth to Edmund's neck, stoking the fire that is still building up under Edmund's belly – and Edmund cannot help but sigh in pleasure.

Sometimes it is the forbidden fruit that is the sweetest.

Not always – but when it is true it is extremely so. Peter is proof of that.

The hands slide against Edmund's thighs, and it feels so good that Edmund thinks his mind will explode from the pleasure. At the same time, it's bad – it makes him hot and aching and wanting. A delicious shiver runs up his spine as Peter casually strokes the inside of his thigh – and there is nothing more that he wants – or so he'd like to say. But Peter's hands have to move up first, to – to touch him. And when he does – there will truly be nothing more that Edmund could -

Edmund gasps as Peter's hands reach up higher.

"Edmund," Peter whispers, his face a study in reckless desire – his eyes lidded and, from the miniscule amount of light coming in from the streets, Edmund concludes that his eyes are probably dilated. Probably. His lips, parted and swollen red, entices Edmund into wanting to kiss them forever. His cheeks and neck, dusted in a smattering of red – or perhaps more, but it's hard to tell with so little light – makes the snakes in Edmund's belly uncoil slowly and sensually, as though in a mating dance, and every touch is felt before Peter ever touches him – and even when Peter doesn't touch him at all. He anticipates the touch so strongly that it hurts to be touched, even though he'd known it was coming, and when he is not touched it aches like a bee sting. It is like an explosion of feeling. It is like a magic looking glass makes the world brighter and sharper and more inhumanly, etherally, unmatchably beautiful, even though he is only seeing them through cracks in the glass.

But Edmund cannot spare much thought to his own state – his eyes are affixed to his brother's long, sinuous body, his mind furiously working on nothing but how to give Peter pleasure and take it from him in return.

This… it is like nothing else.

He had been wrong when he'd thought that he would miss Narnia most when all was said and done – but he can be excused for his mistake. He hadn't known that this was what he had been waiting for all along, and he hadn't known that he could have it, or that it would feel so good that being pressed onto the hard ground is a pleasure in itself, not a hardship. He hadn't known what Peter looked like when he was in desire's grasp.

"Edmund," Peter whispers. "Let me possess you."

Edmund is not a child. Has not been one in a long time. He knows exactly what Peter is asking for.

But how could he resist? He has always loved Peter.

"Yes," he agrees.

Peter smiles, raising himself from the ground with muscled forearms and tugging Edmund up. The smile does not reach his desire-laden eyes, but Edmund thinks that the fact that desire has not left those eyes is a smile of its own – a dangerous, horrible smile – just as beautiful, dangerous and horrible as their twisted love. "My room," he states, and Edmund nods, not trusting himself to speak.

As a child, a teacher once told him – tears in her eyes – that desire made slaves of all mankind. Of course he hadn't understood then, but looking in Peter's eyes and feeling his body explode into all of these feelings – he thinks he might understand.

The door is barely locked before he is falling onto Peter's bed, being kissed wildly as his shirt is lifted and thrown to one side. It seems as though Peter is reaching for any bit of skin he can get – Edmund's shoulder, Edmund's neck, his chest – everything is given the same amount of attention… and that attention is given copiously. As he is being kissed, one of Peter's hands travel downwards to the gentle elastics of his pajama bottoms before it is tugged away without another thought, and Edmund helpfully slides it off his legs as Peter works on his own clothes.

And when Edmund finishes he helps Peter with his – that's when he notices that his hands are shaking, but the notice is only brief before he is distracted by Peter's needy kiss against his lips, the hand on his shoulder pushing him onto the bed insistently as if trying to create a mould of his body in the sheets – though if this is Peter's intent he has likely succeeded.

But that observation, too, is brief. Almost a soon as he notices this, he is distracted by Peter's tongue in his mouth – and this time it barely feels like a kiss for all that Peter's tongue thrashes wildly in his mouth, for all that Peter's lips grind against his as if trying to melt into him.

It is the most desperate kiss he has ever partaken in – and perhaps the best as well.

He barely notices that he is naked when he is, or perhaps he was naked before and is only noticing it now, but he spares himself only a second to contemplate that as he returns Peter's kiss, as he breaks their kiss with an obscene pop – a testament to how hungry and how desperate they were – and begins work on Peter's neck as Peter pants and gasps out his pleasure and lack of oxygen. Most of the time they're probably both, but thankfully he does not need air and can go on like this forever, and that's Peter's hands trailing up his waist and what are they doing? And Peter's hands are roaming again, as if trying to commit him to memory as Edmund commits to memory what Peter feels like under his lips and under his fingertips, and he hopes that his fingers don't grow suddenly cold and oh Aslan, he's sure that something that everyone believes is wrong should be wrong but he thinks that everyone have made a mistake and this is the best thing in the world and they're missing out and his body is aching for attention even while Peter gives it and his mind is working and working and running and he can barely keep a thought running before it disappears and that should be bad but he can't care less as long as Peter never stops -

"Edmund," Peter gasps, as Edmund flips them around, lying above Peter and grinding their cocks together and it's probably a bit too dry but he can't care about anything except this. There is nothing except this, no impending death, no broken hearts.

"I love you," Edmund growls.

Peter gasps again, and it's quite possibly the sexiest thing Edmund has ever seen, but he barely has a second to catalogue it as he rolls his hips again, and a moan tears its way out of his throat as his head spins with pleasure.

"Say you love me," Edmund commands in a low growl.

Peter gasps, staring at him with awe for a moment, but Edmund does not stop rolling their hips against each other's. "I love you," Peter moans, his voice dipping in pitch as Edmund repeats his motion again. "Oh Edmund, I love you so dearly."

Edmund smiles.

"So beautiful, Ed – So beautiful it drives me mad. Couldn't stop looking. Couldn't stop wanting. Wanted so much that it killed me -" Peter moans as he thrusts upwards against Edmund, but for Edmund's part his mind is too clogged with pleasure to formulate his reply, and even his understanding of Peter's words comes a few seconds late but it doesn't matter. He loves this.

He has never loved anything more.

Not even Narnia.

"Tell me you have something lubricating in here," Edmund purrs.

He's always wanted this – so of course he'd gone and researched what 'this' was.

Peter moans, looking helpless and so delicious that it makes Edmund's toes curl. "Drawer," he moans. "Oh Aslan, please don't stop."

Edmund smirks. "Aslan would probably be upset at the way you used his name," he teases, but finds himself not caring as Peter fumbles within the nearby wooden drawer on the nightstand and withdraws something, then fumbles against the cap, stopping from time to time as Edmund rolls his hips against Peter's, as if to catch his breath.

He doesn't protest when Peter inserts fingers into him clumsily and uncomfortably. This was the whole point, after all – but is not above stroking Peter to with his hands to watch Peter lose his composure and train of thought.

It's amazing to have Peter lose his train of thought.

Horrible, too, some part of his mind supplies. Horrible and disgusting and disturbing to see Peter like this – but for the life of him he can't remember why. Something within him gives a little to see Peter like this – but he can't care less.

Nothing else matters.

He feels as though there is magic in the air – he'd always been most sensitive to magic after – after -

What on Earth -?

Edmund nearly screams at the sensation of the fingers stroking something deep inside him, something that makes his body shudder from top to toe and go mad and hot and aching with _want_. And he would have screamed too, had he not muffled it with a hand.

"Edmund," Peter whispers, sounding awed.

Edmund is too busy not screaming to pay him any mind, as Peter strokes him in just the right place and widens him simultaneously.

"Edmund, can I?" Peter asks softly.

Edmund nods quickly, his breathing evening slightly as the fingers disappear.

"I will make it good. I give you my word," Peter murmurs against his ear, but the only thing Edmund really notices is the feel of hot, hot air against his neck and the feel of Peter's tongue as it licks up the strip of his skin at the side of his ear – and he is too busy living in that moment to comprehend anything that Peter is saying.

He feels something hot against his pucker – then heat. Glorious heat. Painfully glorious heat, but he has been numb to all changes in temperature for a while now and this heat is more delicious than he can describe – like eating an ice-cream after years of going without in a desert. It is intoxicating, more so than the strongest wines. It is pleasurable, more so than anything he has felt before. And it is pulsing inside him, transmitting the pulsing to all of Edmund's insides, until the world narrows in scope and becomes only Peter sliding inside Edmund.

"Does it hurt?" Peter asks.

It does, but to one who has gone without pain for a very long time, and barely felt an unpleasantness beside, this feeling is exquisite. Elegant, almost, and certainly surprising; like a sudden line of poetry perfectly buried between lines of dull post. He doesn't think he can ever give it up.

He will never give this up.

"I'm fine," he replies. "You can move, if you want."

Peter nods, biting his lip. Edmund thinks of his own cock surrounded by Peter's heat and thinks he knows what Peter must be feeling. To not want to hurt someone, and yet want to achieve his own release.

He moves Peter's hand over his cock and strokes it slowly. Peter stares at him for a moment, but copies the motion.

"You can move," he repeats, gasping with pleasure. "As long as you keep doing that."

Compromise made, Peter does indeed begin to move – and the movement is every bit as exquisite as the feel of Peter moving into him. The hands on his hips are tight, but they too feel heat and pain – the heat Peter's warm palms and the pain of Peter's nails digging into them, leaving red crescent moons on his skin and patches of dark bruises, as if to remind him of the night sky they had watched before indulging in this.

"I love you," Peter moans, starting to thrust in earnest. His hand, both the one digging into Edmund's skin and the one on Edmund's cock, begin to shake harder, and Edmund finds himself close – so close – he doesn't know what to, but he knows that it will feel like nothing he has ever felt before.

He can hardly breathe, hardly wait for it.

And when it does come – when it does his vision is consumed to nothingness, his body shivering violently until he becomes purely a creature of the culmination of his lust. It's heaven, it's surreal – he'd give up Narnia for this if he could, but it is no longer his to barter.

As he comes down from his high, he reflects that men truly are slaves to desire.

He looks in Peter's face, gazes upon the lost, ecstatic look as Peter clings to him. Beautiful, so beautiful.

To think that he might never look upon this again…

But, he thinks, he was never meant to partake in this anyway. A stab of guilt pierces his heart as he realises that he could have ruptured the protections completely in his mad passion – and he would have thought it worthwhile.

"Peter," he murmurs, hating himself and yet thankful to have witnessed this miracle. "Peter!" he says more sharply.

Some of the dazed confusion fades from Peter's eyes, but not all of it – and none of the ecstacy has disappeared as Peter kisses his face enthusiastically, holding his body against Edmund's own – and Edmund hates how warm and safe he feels, but will not stop wanting to feel this way. "That was – that was amazing," Peter exclaims, sounding pleased but tired. His eyelids droop, and Edmund supposes that it might be too cruel to tear himself away now…

He'll stay.

"Really?" Edmund murmurs, but Peter is already asleep.

* * *

Having Peter awaken next to him is a pleasure that he wishes he could indulge in for the rest of both their lives.

But of course, that's impossible.

Peter blinks for a moment, twisting in his arms, then peers under the covers and proceeds to look quite horrified.

"That's rude," he teases, but then there is very little he can do about his impending doom and he has learnt to accept everything – even if it hurts him still.

"I – I thought it was a dream," Peter stammers.

"Fortunately or unfortunately, it isn't," Edmund replies, stretching his body out. "Well, I'd best be going."

Peter frowns. "Edmund… have you slept at all?" he asks with a frown.

Edmund gathers his clothes and begins to dress in them as quickly as he can. He's still deliciously sore in places, but then he's already established that he enjoys pain, as long as he feels something out of it. "Of course I did," he lies, rolling his eyes. "But I awoke before you. You don't see any dark eyebags here, do you?' he asks, touching the area under his eyes for good effect.

"I… I'm sorry, Edmund," Peter murmurs. "I should never have – we can never -"

Edmund thinks of the White Witch. If not for her, he would have protested this decision vehemently. But alas, he has made his bed. That Aslan gave him two decade's worth of stolen years before he was made to lie in it is something that is more than he is worth. And if Aslan knew the feelings he would invoke in Peter, perhaps he would never have been allowed those years.

But he regrets none of it, and to Aslan he only feels fondness.

"I know," Edmund says, smiling. Peter flushes slightly and fixes him a slightly intense look, but he pulls the shirt over his thin body to escape that look, and when it is over his head he turns to the door so he does not have to meet Peter's eyes.

He knows all too well.

* * *

"You should try for a music scholarship," Peter comments.

Edmund starts – he'd been busy playing the piano again, and hadn't even thought that anyone could have come home this early.

"You should. You're very good – and it's important to follow your heart," Peter repeats.

"Don't give me that," Edmund whispers. "Just don't. Every time I follow my heart, it leads me to you."

Edmund can see Peter blush from the corner of his eyes – and he wishes that, if only for a moment, he could have been himself, could have taken advantage of Peter's strong feelings for him. He wishes for it so badly that he even plays it out in his head. It's breathtaking. For a moment he cannot bring himself to leave Peter's side.

But the moment passes.

* * *

When Lucy insists on going to an amusement park with him, he'd nodded and agreed. But he hadn't expected to have such a good time.

It's dark now, and he's satisfied.

"Isn't there anything you'd like to do?" Lucy asks softly.

Edmund looks back at the amusement park – now lit up in a dazzling, dizzying array of lightbulbs. Red, blue, green, yellow, purple, pink. He thinks of having sat on the rollercoaster, having the wind rush past his face, having sat next to Lucy on the ferris wheel. It is like a dream – even if much of the time he'd pictured a different sibling beside him.

"Lucy," he says quietly. "You've fulfilled it for me – I hadn't even known I wanted to come," he says with a smile.

Lucy looks away. There are sparkling tears in her eyes, lit by the lights of the amusement park. "But it's not enough. How could it ever be enough?"

"I'm satisfied," Edmund replies. "I think I've always known. It isn't so bad when you've always known, I think."

"Don't you wish you could have come with Peter?" Lucy whispers. "I tried to ask him."

Edmund smiles. "I like your company, too."

"You must think me so selfish – I don't wish to tell them. I don't want them to hog up all the time with you," Lucy says quietly. "If they knew, I would never spend another second with you again, and you'll leave."

"Lucy," Edmund whispers, wishing she could understand, if only to take some of her anguish away. "I don't wish to tell them either. You're doing me a favour – spending your days with me as your focus. It's enough for me. It's bad enough that I'm taking up your time for something that is inevitable anyway, but to take up Susan's time, to take up Peter's time – I can't bear that. It'll drive me mad. I don't wish for-"

"That's not true! You aren't taking up my time! You aren't! Oh Edmund, I would regret it forever if I had not known. And I'm so afraid – Peter and Susan will hate me for knowing, I know they will," Lucy says, even as Edmund very carefully wipes her tears away.

Edmund smiles, placing a finger against his lips to shush her. "They won't ever know that you knew. They won't even know when I'm gone."

"You're not being fair," Lucy says softly, taking his hand in hers – but she doesn't say any more than that.

* * *

"Edmund," Peter greets softly.

Edmund takes his hands off the piano, which he has been trying – not very successfully – to keep his hands away from. He turns and smiles. "Peter."

Peter blushes and looks away. He's always doing that when he sees Edmund now, and Edmund thinks – he thinks that Peter might – _no,_ it doesn't even bear thinking. It would be too cruel. To both of them. "I came to fetch you for dinner," Peter says, avoiding Edmund's eyes by keeping his own eyes on the piano. Edmund keeps hoping that he's reading the signs wrong, that the intense looks and blushes that Peter favours him with when they speak is just a blush of embarrassment for what they had done – but no one could be that foolish.

Besides, Lucy had just given him the very same message not two minutes ago.

"Oh," Edmund replies – what else is he to say?

He places his fingers on the piano again. perhaps this could take away some of the awkwardness.

He can't stop loving Peter. He won't. If he were any other man in any other situation he might have pondered it for Peter's sake, but now he considers it his fair due.

Peter suddenly takes a deep breath, and before Edmund can figure out exactly what is going on, Peter's hands reach out for the piano, covering Edmund's fingers with his own. From the corner of his eyes, Edmund sees a deep red blush on Peter's cheeks – one that is quickly spreading to his neck. Then, with an aching slowness, he begins to play, his fingers dancing across the piano and on Edmund's fingers when necessary. Edmund thinks of a polite way to tell him to stop even as he attempts to pull his hands away – but then he is enchanted, spellbound by the melody. It is a poor recreation of the melody that he had played, but Edmund recognises it nonetheless.

Just as he recognises what Peter is attempting to convey to him.

"I know I can't do it right," Peter murmurs in his ear, leaning over him. "But I want to try."

Edmund can't truly tell if he's talking about the melody or their relationship. Perhaps both. But either way, he can't meet Peter's eyes. Even the sound of his voice – so earnest, so hopeful – is making Edmund's head spin. He doesn't fully understand and he doesn't want to. This is – is -

_The most horrible and beautiful thing in the world._

Boldness. Courage. Romanticism. The man he loves.

All the elements of a perfect love is right in front of his eyes – and he can never partake in a single moment of it. It is one thing to sleep in Peter's bed. It is quite another to promise his heart when it is already promised to the cold and the darkness… even if Edmund dearly wishes that he could have promised it to Peter instead.

At any other time he would have been giddy with happiness – but now he wished that these qualities never appeared before his eyes.

It is too cruel to dangle water before a man dying of thirst. But it is far more cruel to dangle what so many believe to be the pinnacle of human emotion in front of him, waiting for his outstretched hands, while knowing that he will never have it. Knowing that he can curse and wish, knowing that he could take Peter's hand anyway and hurt him doubly when Peter is forced to destroy the last remnants of him – and knowing that he would never be able to do so.

After all, he loves Peter.

"We can't," Edmund whispers.

"We can," Peter says, suddenly fierce. "I know we- hello, Lucy."

Edmund turns. Sure enough, Lucy is there in the door. From the expression on her face, it's obvious that she knows exactly what had occured before she'd interrupted them.

Lucy stares a hole into him -surprisingly, Peter is give the same treatment. Unbidden, he remembers: "You'll take Peter with you, and I will never forgive either of you."

Silently, he apologises and thanks Lucy for her interruption.

" I'm sorry," he apologises. "I got carried away," Edmund says to both of them, and he means both the meal and his relationship with Peter – because it was his fault for not pulling away.

Lucy opens her mouth, perhaps to scold them both. Then, suddenly, without warning, her expression changes. All traces of anger have vanished, giving way to a quiet, aching sadness. "Oh," she says softly, her eyes suspiciously shiny. Something like a smile twists against her lips, bitter and sad. "I see. Let's go to dinner, then."

He hopes she isn't going to cry.

* * *

This time, it is Lucy and not Peter who is sitting with him by the door.

"I can't do this," she whispers. "I feel so guilty."

"Do what?" Edmund asks, alarmed. He loves his sisters and would do nearly anything for them. Not everything – even his sisters would never get him to leave Peter if there was even the slightest chance of their relationship ever flourishing. But any relationship he has will have to die as he does. To do this to Lucy is reprehensible enough – he can hardly forgive himself, and nights are very good times for self-blame.

"Peter is in love with you," Lucy whispers.

"No he's not," Edmund retorts immediately, worried about the direction this is taking.

Lucy smiles sadly. "This isn't the time for that sort of game, Edmund," she says softly. She takes a deep breath. "And you know this very well. I _know_ Peter. I am not unaware of the way he has felt… but I thought that it had passed. I don't wish to deceive myself, Edmund. I know what I walked into. I saw the way he looked at you. He is in love with you and we both know it. You can deny it if you wish, but it'd only be counterproductive. I don't think he ever stopped loving you," Lucy says, and Edmund feels a jolt of guilt. At the same time, these words make him so deliriously happy. Like everything else about Peter, it makes his head hurt just to think it. "I can't take it… not when I know…"

"I know," Edmund agrees. "I know what you mean. And believe me, I've tried to stay away from him. But every time I look into his eyes…" he trails off wistfully. "I can't-"

"That's not what I'm saying," Lucy interrupts. "I think – I think you should accept his love."

"Are you _insane_?" Edmund asks incredulously. "It would only hurt him."

Lucy shrugs. "He doesn't have to know, does he?" she asks, but she looks very miserable indeed.

"I thought Peter was your favourite brother," Edmund comments, not trusting his voice to anything else. At least this should put her on the offensive.

"He is," Lucy acknowledges, a little too calmly for his taste. "But Peter's not the one who's dying. I can't help thinking that we haven't done right by you. So many years, and we never once tried to find the cure. So many years, and I am the only one who knows that you'll-" she cuts herself off. "Peter isn't my only brother. I think, Edmund… I think that you deserve to be selfish for a little while."

A little while.

"Weren't you afraid that I'd take Peter with me?" Edmund asks softly, with all the respect due the sacrifice she is making.

Lucy smiles unhappily. "I'll always have Susan. You can take Peter with you, if you have to. I know that come winter, whether or not you and he become lovers, he will not be the same person he once was. I'll hate you for that, always, but still I'll love you and wish you well."

Edmund smiles sadly. It is bad enough that she knows he is dying, that he is hurting her like this. And so… "Lucy, I'm not going to Peter away from you."

As if these are the magic words, she jumps onto him and clings to him with her suddenly long arms. Absently, he reflects that his sister has grown.

"Oh Edmund, I am so selfish," she sobs. "I am so selfish."

Edmund sighs. "I am, too."

Lucy laughs a melancholic laugh that breaks all pretense of Queen Lucy the Valiant. "No, you are not. I should think that you are the most unselfish person that I know."

It is, Edmund decides, this beautiful laugh that allows Edmund to truly grieve for himself for the first time.

Somehow, he doesn't think it will be the last.

"_High King Peter_," Lucy says, a mocking edge to her voice even as she hugs Edmund close. "He often worries about never going to Narnia again, I know. But as for us – our burdens are so much heavier. _High King Peter_ is loved so much that he never has to worry about his beloved's death. I hate it. I hate it!"

Edmund smiles fondly, if a little sadly. In this she is still so much of a child that it breaks his heart. "I'm sorry to make you bear this burden." he can never apologise enough for this.

"Never apologise," Lucy whispers, lips set tightly in a grim line. "I would rather be dead myself than have never known."

* * *

Edmund finds himself making a habit of watching Susan. She is the one with whom he has least interaction with, and it pains him to know that he will part with her on such frosty terms. They are not unkind to one another, of course, but this distance is too much to bear.

Even if it saves her pain after.

"Edmund? You have been watching me recently," Susan comments.

Edmund shrugs. "I suppose I have been watching everyone, really. When have we all grown up? I don't seem to have noticed it."

"You're not grown up," Susan teases. "Perhaps next year, when you're sixteen."

Edmund smiles and shrugs. " Where has all the time gone? I remember being ten and having Lucy tell us about the forest within the closet. I do so miss our childhood."

"Yes, we had such active imaginations, didn't we?" Susan asks with a laugh. "I miss it, too."

Edmund doesn't correct her.

"Do you remember our games then?" Edward asks. "It was an easier time, wasn't it? Sometimes I miss being able to be royalty – but of course we are far too old for it now," Edmund comments. "The swordfights, the battles – those were glorious. If I could be a child again…" he says wistfully.

"And the dances," Susan says dreamily. Her eyes go unfocused. "The suitors. Yes, I wish for it too, sometimes."

Edmund smiles. Dances, is it? For Susan, he will do something more than anything he has ever done for his other siblings -_ but then, all he had done was to break their hearts_ – . "Do you want to? Just one more time?"

"What?" Susan asks, looking confused.

Edmund smiles. "One more time before we truly grow up," he tells her. "May I have this dance, your Majesty?" he asks, extending a hand.

Susan giggles. "We are far too old for that," she comments. "Me especially."

"It's just this once," Edmund coaxes. "Please? I don't want to be in such a hurry to grow up. I just want – a last dance, to say goodbye."

In more ways than one.

"Oh, alright," Susan says, accepting his hand and putting a song on. "But we're staying in my room. I don't want the others to see me behaving like this – they're all quite convinced that it's real. A dose of reality is what they need."

Edmund smiles. What a coincidence – it's a song of goodbyes too.

He guides her to the small space there is. The space doesn't matter. He's sure that she'll get into it soon enough… and he wants to put the spark of Narnia back into her heart. Slowly, he places his hands in the appropriate places and begins to dance. She returns the gesture and begins to dance with him in a dreamlike fashion – her eyes are glazed over, mind seemingly in some memory or other, a serene smile on her lips.

"I danced with him, once," Susan whispers.

"Who?" Edmund asks.

"My ideal suitor," Susan replies absently. "Do you remember him, I wonder? His name was Caspian. He was a prince. It is truly something to be in love with an imagination, for they can do us no true wrong. But they do not have any substance in reality," she finishes sadly.

Edmund keeps silent. That must have been a horrible memory, and he feels responsible for it.

"Dancing with him was glorious," Susan says, moving through the steps with practiced ease, though she does not appear to be paying much attention to it. "Even if it was only in my mind."

Edmund's mind shows him a vision of him dancing with Peter, and for one moment he pretends – but then he returns to Earth, to his sister.

"Of course, I never saw him again. It was beautiful and tragic, " Susan says with the sigh of a maiden in love. Edmund wishes that he could have brought Caspian to her, now. Her story draws too many parallels that he would rather not see, and it hurts him to see Peter dancing alone in his mind's eye, that same resigned yet serene look on his face as he thinks of Edmund.

"Sometimes," Susan says, concluding the dance with a perfect curtsey. "The things that are the most perfect are also the worst choices for us."

Edmund can't help but smile, despite the aching in his heart. "Yes," he agrees. "I know exactly what you mean."

* * *

"I saw you dancing," Lucy murmurs.

Edmund smiles softly. "I wanted her to remember it. I wanted her to remember how great it felt, how happy we usually were. I… perhaps it's selfish, but it's a part of us that I never really wanted to forget. A part of us that I don't want any one of us to ever forget."

Lucy nods, accepting the explanation. "Peter saw, too," she says in a soft, cautious voice.

Edmund frowns. "Is something wrong?"

Lucy smiles and shakes her head. "Nothing is wrong," she says, though she continues to look troubled.

But then, she's looked like this ever since their conversation about Narnia.

He hates knowing that she knows. He's hated it since the first time she'd found out, eyes wide with horror and with the plea to tell her that it's a joke, a lie. He hates knowing that she's taking it even worse than he has – because he can accept it and let his life go by, but she cannot. She thinks that while he waits for death he should have everything… but what's the point? He's going to disappear anyway. He doesn't understand.

It is, he thinks,_ life_ and not _death_ that is harder.

But everyone has to die. And… rather than that, he's thinking of it as rest. He won't be himself. He will get to rest forever as a memory in some half – forgotten world, and this one besides. It's enough for him to know that Lucy will cry for him, that Susan and Peter would have cried for him if they knew.

* * *

"I saw you dancing," Peter says, unknowingly repeating Lucy's words exactly, and Edmund smiles despite himself.

"I thought it would be nice for Susan to remember," he answers.

"Yes, it was," Peter agrees, eyes fixed on Edmund. He reaches out tentatively and takes Edmund's hand. "Dance with me," he says, except it feels more like an order, and before Edmund knows what he's doing he's already agreeing.

Peter guides him to the music room and holds him close in a dance for lovers.

"Peter-" Edmund protests.

Peter doesn't seem to care. Instead, he begins to move.

Edmund thinks of Susan's words – "Dancing with him was glorious." – and he can't help but want to take this dance for himself and make a memory of it in his mind, in his heart, and likewise do the same to Peter. No matter what happens, this will always be true.

He doesn't think he's a very nice person.

As Peter clutches his waist firmly, Edmund's breath catches and he feels like – like – he can't quite describe it, but it's a pleasant feeling. Melancholic, but somehow pleasant.

"I'm waiting for you," Peter whispers, and Edmund's heart breaks at those words. "You can take as much time as you want," Peter promises.

It isn't fair.

"I can't," he whispers, tears welling up in his eyes.

He really can't. Oh Aslan, he wishes that he could – but he can't. He's going to disappear, no matter what he wants, and he's not exactly happy about that. But if Peter says such things to him, it'll just be all the worse for it. He can't bear to want to live. He can't bear it. He can't bear it if he could have had Peter all the time but never will.

"I know," Peter murmurs. "That's why I'll wait. One year. Ten years. A hundred years. I'll wait for you to be ready again."

It's not fair!

How can he – ?

"I can't," he chokes. "I can't."

"Forever, if need be," Peter assures him, unknowingly making the situation worse with every sweet word that drops from his lips. "I – I might already have lost Narnia, but I haven't lost _you_.I can't do anything about Narnia now, but you – if I lose something even more important than Narnia… I don't ever want to lose anything I love so dearly again."

Edmund wants to scream. Instead, frustrated tears pours down his face.

Peter releases him for a moment, brushing his tears away with a gentle thumb. "I know I was wrong," he says. "And I can't promise I'll never be so stupid again – but I want to try. For you."

This is what he never wanted Peter to feel. But now… now he will break Peter's heart.

It's bad enough facing Lucy's tear-stained face. He doesn't want to imagine Peter mourning him. He hates the image of Peter taking Susan's place, dancing with a stranger and forever mourning the love that never was and will never be. He hates the image of Peter taking Lucy's place and Lucy taking his own as Lucy confirms the fact that they will neither of them ever see Edmund again, because all he can imagine of that outcome is Peter crying and the only thing that's kept him from going completely insane is the thought that his siblings will go on and live happily with him tucked away quietly in a little dark, neglected corner of their hearts.

How can he claim to love Peter when the only thing he can do is bring him heartache (as he already does Lucy)?

"I spoke to Lucy," Peter murmurs as they manoeuvre through a particularly difficult step… and Edmund's blood turns to ice right in his veins.

"Oh?" he breathes, inwardly hoping that Lucy hadn't betrayed his confidence.

He can't bear to subject Peter to that.

"She said that I was foolish to give up the things that I wanted. She thinks I should have fought for Narnia," Peter whispers. "But Aslan is always right. What was I to do? She said I should have tried anyway," Peter murmurs, a profound grief in his eyes. " She said that I should fight for you. Ed, I want to fight for you. I can't bear to lose you to anyone else. She thinks that I have made you sacrifice too much – and I _agree_. That's why, this time – this time, let me sacrifice my time to wait for you."

Edmund inwardly curses Lucy, though he knows she only has good intentions.

"You shouldn't," he says harshly, pulling his arms away.

Lucy may want him to be happy, but he knows he can't. He can't do this to Peter. Neither can he do this to Lucy.

"Ed," Peter says softly. "I think I was always waiting for you anyway."

Edmund's heart shatters and he bolts.

Why? Why this, why now?

Why?

* * *

Lucy is sitting on his bed, waiting for him when he re-enters his room.

"Do you not want to be happy?" she asks.

Of course he does. "You should know why I can't accept his love," Edmund chides. "And in any case, I thought you wouldn't want me to tell him. It's… awfully near Winter. I'm afraid. I can't start anything now, it would be too heartless of me."

His eyes fall on the calender. First October.

How quickly time ticks away.

A month. A month at most. That is all the time he has now.

Maybe less than that, even. It's not unheard of for snow to already have fallen – and every day he lives, he spends wondering when the snow will start falling. Even if it does not fall, he wonders if the protections will give – and it's taxing. Waiting to die, that is. He'd never thought that it would be tiresome and exhausting rather than filled with mind-gripping fear, but it is. It is filled with exhaustion and fatigue and sadness, but not fear.

"It'll soon be time," Lucy murmurs. "I don't want you or Peter to regret this."

"I won't," Edmund says softly. "I love him. I want him to be happy. My being with him will not make that happen. I know that."

"What about him?" Lucy asks.

Edmund smiles sadly. "He'll get the silly notion out of his head soon enough. He managed all those years ago; he can do so again."

"Even if he can… I don't want to see him regret this. With the way he goes on about Narnia…" she says, trailing off. "Peter loves you more than he does Narnia – he told me so himself. I know you think that he managed to forget everything easily – but he didn't. I know he cried just as hard as you did. I know this, because he cried in my presence. I know it left a shadow in him. If you leave now, without ever having tried this – it will always scar him and mark him."

"If I tell him, what then? I will have to tell him the truth and it will only break his heart."

Lucy closes her eyes. "You don't understand at all."

No, he understands too well.

"Sometimes, the things that are the most perfect are also the worst choices for us," Edmund echoes Susan's words.

It's something that he has repeated to himself, over and over again.

"You have already broken his heart," Lucy murmurs, and to that Edmund says nothing. It is true.

He's just sure that he would have further broken Peter's heart if anything had happened.

* * *

The snowfall is – despite what he'd believed – a pleasant occurence. He sits in the park quietly, listening to the snow thud onto the ground and feeling the protections wash away.

In his mind's eye he sees Lucy frozen to the spot, unmoving, as she realises just what is happening.

It's alright, he thinks, somehow trying to reach her through telepathy. It's alright. It doesn't hurt. It isn't scary. In fact, it feels a lot like coming home at last. It's not even cold… it just feels like he's going to melt away and become part of the snow forever.

He's not going to disappear, he's going to become the snow.

He starts – in the distance he sees someone running towards him. "Edmund!" Lucy shouts. As she nears the bench he's sitting at, he notices that she's crying. "Edmund," she says, clutching his arm. " Edmund, you can't go yet, I -"

"How did you know I'd be here?' he asks.

"I… overheard you planning," Lucy replies. "That doesn't matter! You can't leave yet! You can't!"

"I'm sorry," Edmund says softly. He embraces her.

She shivers.

"You can't go yet…" Lucy sobs. "Tell me it doesn't hurt."

"It doesn't hurt," Edmund replies, smiling. "I feel like I'm finally going home," he tells her. "I'm going to be part of the snow. I won't disappear."

"Snow melts," she hisses.

"I'll be the water in the snow, too – and you'll see me again next winter and every winter after, when you look at the snow. It's not so bad, Lucy."

"I'll never forgive you if you disappear," she whispers.

"I'm sorry," Edmund whispers, wishing once again that he'd never told her the truth.

"Do you remember the day we talked about the way you'd danced with Susan?" Lucy asks suddenly, now looking desperate – and guilty. "You owe me a dance, too."

Edmund nods, feeling sleepy as he takes her hand.

"Stay with me for a bit," Lucy begs, as he dances with her clumsily. "I never told you – that was the day Peter told me that he'd kept having nightmares – nightmares of you disappearing into the snow and leaving us forever," Lucy whispers, tears falling from her eyes. "Aslan must have wanted him to know, but I didn't dare… I didn't dare! He told me – told me that – listen to me, Edmund!," she shouts, but he feels so at peace that he can barely hear her. "Listen to me," she sobs. "He told me that he could never, never let you go again," she whispers.

It is a stab of pain in his heart.

"Did he truly say that?" he whispers as he very carefully dips her and lifts her up again.

Lucy nods, her hands clutching his arms tightly enough that he can feel it through the numbness pervading his body. "I knew then that I would have to give him up, one way or another – but I was too terrified of losing both of you. And now… and now…"

"You only did what you thought was right. I don't blame you," Edmund murmurs, brushing her tears away.

"No, I didn't! I knew it wasn't right! But I was scared. I'm sorry for being scared. After all this time, what I fear most is losing all of you. And to lose both of you, when Susan no longer believes… I… I'm a coward."

Edmund smiles. He can no longer speak very loudly, but it is quiet enough that he's sure Lucy can make out his words. "It's alright. Really. Thank you for telling me. It must have taken a lot of courage."

She says something else, but he can no longer make out the words, so he nods and smiles.

A sparkling tear splashes against his cheek – he feels himself falling onto her. A brief flash of a memory overcomes his senses, of a boy telling him that he had always been waiting... and then he can see nothing else.

* * *

Lucy stares at the pile of snow in her arms, knowing that it was once her brother – and she can't… can't summon up the old love she usually feels for Narnia any longer. She tries – oh, she tries so hard – because Edmund once told her that this was their connection. That they would both always love Narnia.

She thought she always would, too – even after Aslan told her the truth, she'd loved Narnia.

And if she had never come to see Edmund perhaps she always would.

She always thought that Narnia had taught her courage – but when it came to one of the few only people who mattered, she'd not done the right thing. She was too scared of losing them both so easily that she'd encouraged Edmund to keep his distance, all the while knowing that she should have given Edmund his peaceful end. She should have told Peter anyway. She should have told Edmund – the dreams were certainly a sign from Aslan that Peter should be told, that he deserved to be told. But she was too cowardly.

Funny how this incident is the one to show her how much of a coward she really is.

If she knew that she would see this – knew that she would see her brother smile at her and forgive her everything, knew that she would watch him turn to snow before her eyes, frozen and gone – if she had just_ known_, no force on Earth or Narnia would have stopped her from giving them both the truth.

She thinks of him dancing with Susan, with Peter – and wished that Peter had this dance instead of her, even if his heart would have died with Edmund.

At least she would have done right by both of them.

She can't stop crying, but she finishes the dance all by herself even as tears blur her vision. "I'm so sorry," she whispers. She's not sure if he can hear her, but she clutches whatever she can of the snow that Edmund had left behind. "I'm so sorry."

She almost wishes she'd never come, but all in all she is glad to have come.

For one second, just that one second, he'd danced so gracefully that she'd felt like a queen again.

She will always remember him that way.

"I'll learn," she promises the snow. "I'll learn to be brave. I'll learn to love Narnia again."

Slowly, with the most care she can afford it, she releases the snow onto the ground. She can hardly see for the tears on her face. She can hardly breathe for the snot in her nose.

But that's fine. She's just learning a little bit of what it feels like to be Edmund.

"I will never forget."

She walks away, and it feels like a thousand nettles are stinging her. It feels like… like she's torn a part of her heart out and left it behind, for good.

That's fine. Edmund will take care of it for her. She knows he will.

She just can't stop crying.

* * *

Peter is still waiting.

Days, nights. Tedious mornings, unbearable afternoons, melancholic evenings. Heartbreaking nights, too, when he has that nightmare again and awakens to only to be tormented by the fact that Edmund is really gone and he doesn't know what to do.

He can only hope Edmund chooses to come home soon.

After all, it's only a dream, right?

Usually in such uncertainties he would speak to Edmund – out at the door in the still of the night. Usually. But Edmund isn't here anymore. Usually, when Edmund isn't here he would speak to Lucy, but she isn't here either. Physically she's always the next room over, but in reality she always seems in a world of her own. They are lucky to get a response out of her half the time – it seems as though Edmund's leaving has hit her rather hard… but surely not as hard as it has hit Peter.

Peter often thinks he'd lost his mind.

Some days he greets Lucy, and there is a spark of recognition in her eyes. She opens her mouth as if to speak, but looks away almost at once. Peter thinks he recognises guilt in her manner, but can't be completely sure. Some nights he walks to Lucy's room, knowing that she barely hears him anyway – and while she is usually awake in her room, some nights he finds her sitting by the door in the same position that he'd often found Edmund in. Those nights are the worse, for his mind substitues images and he often imagines that Edmund has come home to him at last. Some nights she is asleep, sobbing Edmund's name as she begs him not to leave her side.

Peter knows what those are like; he has such episodes too.

Some nights he wonders if Edmund had run away from him, but then remembers that Edmund had willingly chosen to be with him. Those are the nights he remembers the physical sensation of Edmund's body best.

He wishes that he knew why Edmund left.

Once upon a time he might have accused Edmund of betrayal, but the time has long since passed. Edmund is loyal to him, to Narnia – but there isn't really a Narnia any more (not to him) and he prays to all the deities he knows that there still exists a little brother whom Peter had not done well enough by.

Last winter, a picture of a snowflake blossomed over his heart. He'd watched it appear millimeter by millimeter as the snow fell outside. He thinks it's a hallucination. Certainly it's not a fixture – it disappears after the snow.

He hates it.

He's tried, over and over again, to scrub away the reminder of the White Witch. Edmund doesn't need to see this. He will think it mocking when he returns to see Peter, and Peter cannot bear the thought of him disappearing again. But no matter how hard Peter scrubs, it never disappears – even when Peter scrubs so hard that he bleeds, the skin heals neatly and the picture becomes once again whole before long. And when he walks out into the winter he never feels cold, nor warm. The temperature is always just right. Sometimes he thinks that it's a bit of magic ; mostly he thinks that he is hallucinating again.

It feels like his life has been flushed down the drain. The person he loves is gone and his favourite sister cannot bear to look him in the eyes. Susan, of course, is more concerned with partying and newfound friendships.

Where is the girl who had danced with Edmund?

But even she is affected by Edmund's absence. She never speaks of Edmund any more. Never contributes to any conversations involving him. Her eyes are often faraway, and once or twice he hears her put on the song they had danced to, a melancholic, reminiscing expression on her face.

He is intimately familiar with that expression – it was the expression he and Susan had both worn when thinking of Narnia, but now it belongs completely to Edmund – because even Narnia pales in importance.

Peter already knows that he will wait forever.

There are few things which are important to him in his life. Narnia is one of them. His siblings are another. But Edmund… Edmund is already on a whole different scale. Countless days he has lain in bed, unwilling to leave it's warmth when it all seems rather hopeless. Countless days he stands by the door, waiting for Edmund to come home. Countless nights, too. And this number will only grow.

Every day that Edmund is gone, Peter only misses him that much more.

He will never say goodbye. He will never give up.

After all, Lucy was right. Some things have to be fought for… even if in the process he must lose himself.

"One year. Ten years. A hundred years. I'll wait for you to be ready again," he whispers, and the words echo in his head.

* * *

When Narnia calls again, Peter hesitates.

Edmund is not in Narnia. He does not know why he is so certain of this fact, but he is – and Peter cannot chance missing Edmund. Not even for a moment.

He feels the tug again, and unwillingly, he accedes to the request.

After all, no time ever passes in Narnia.

And when everything is over, he only feels tired. His sisters seem delighted to see Aslan again, but all Peter is thinking is that Edmund isn't there and he doesn't know whether he will ever see his brother again.

Even as everyone cheers, he cannot help but feel unhappy.

"Why are you so unhappy?" Lucy asks. "We won!"

Peter smiles absently and nods. "Yes, we did," he murmurs, closing his eyes. "But Edmund isn't here."

Lucy's face shutters.

"I hope we go back soon. I don't want to miss him if he comes home."

"… What if – what if – what if he's never coming home again?" Lucy asks.

"That won't happen," Peter says, but his voice shakes. he can't help but shiver at the thought.

"Peter, I – it's long past time for me to tell you the truth," Lucy whispers, her features grim.

* * *

Peter doesn't want to believe Lucy. He knows she's right because even Aslan had endorsed her words. He doesn't want to believe her anyway, because he hates to think of the fact that his sister would have kept something so important to him, that Edmund left without saying goodbye.

"I want to go back," he says firmly.

"But Edmund will never -" Lucy starts to say, her voice catching.

"I promised him," Peter says, backing away. "I promised him that I'd wait as long as he'd needed. This changes nothing."

"Peter, please see sense!" Lucy exclaims, reaching for him - but he continues to back away from her. "There is no use. All he wanted was for us to continue loving Narnia. Susan – Even Susan has not forgotten, nor stopped loving this land. Surely you can't - _Please_."

Peter shakes his head. "I'm sorry, Lucy."

After all, he promised.

* * *

Sometimes, on winter nights, when Peter closes his eyes and places his hand over the snowflake mark, he hears Edmund singing him a lullaby. He always opens his eyes immediately, expecting to see Edmund beside him...

But there is never anyone there.

* * *

A/N: Would have taken out the sex scenes but I think it adds something important to the story. And if the story gets removed... oh well, guess it can't be helped. And if you wanted to read a happy ending... sorry? You can always mentally add to the ending.

Hope you enjoyed!


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